Mazmur 22:13

22:13 They ¹  open their mouths to devour me ² 

like a roaring lion that rips its prey. ³ 

Mazmur 91:13

91:13 You will subdue ⁴  a lion and a snake; ⁵ 

you will trample underfoot a young lion and a serpent.

Mazmur 57:4

57:4 I am surrounded by lions;

I lie down ⁶  among those who want to devour me; ⁷ 

men whose teeth are spears and arrows,

whose tongues are a sharp sword. ⁸ 

[22:13]  ¹ tn “They” refers to the psalmist’s enemies, who in the previous verse are described as “powerful bulls.”

[22:13]  ² tn Heb “they open against me their mouth[s].” To “open the mouth against” is a Hebrew idiom associated with eating and swallowing (see Ezek 2:8; Lam 2:16).

[22:13]  ³ tn Heb “a lion ripping and roaring.”

[91:13]  ⁴ tn Heb “walk upon.”

[91:13]  ⁵ tn Or perhaps “cobra” (see Ps 58:4).

[57:4]  ⁶ tn The cohortative form אֶשְׁכְּבָה (’eshkÿvah, “I lie down”) is problematic, for it does not seem to carry one of the normal functions of the cohortative (resolve or request). One possibility is that the form here is a “pseudo-cohortative” used here in a gnomic sense (IBHS 576-77 §34.5.3b).

[57:4]  ⁷ tn The Hebrew verb לָהַט (lahat) is here understood as a hapax legomenon meaning “devour” (see HALOT 521 s.v. II להט), a homonym of the more common verb meaning “to burn.” A more traditional interpretation takes the verb from this latter root and translates, “those who are aflame” (see BDB 529 s.v.; cf. NASB “those who breathe forth fire”).

[57:4]  ⁸ tn Heb “my life, in the midst of lions, I lie down, devouring ones, sons of mankind, their teeth a spear and arrows and their tongue a sharp sword.” The syntax of the verse is difficult. Another option is to take “my life” with the preceding verse. For this to make sense, one must add a verb, perhaps “and may he deliver” (cf. the LXX), before the phrase. One might then translate, “May God send his loyal love and faithfulness and deliver my life.” If one does take “my life” with v. 4, then the parallelism of v. 5 is altered and one might translate: “in the midst of lions I lie down, [among] men who want to devour me, whose teeth….”